Friday, February 10, 2006

Bengie, Were You Fibbing?

Angel General Manager Bill Stoneman challenged Bengie Molina's claim that the Angels let him go "without a notice, without calling me," saying he spoke with agent Alan Nero, and Manager Mike Scioscia spoke with Molina, both before and after the team's Dec. 7 decision to sever ties with the veteran catcher. Molina's representative also confirmed Stoneman's account.

"We handled it the way we usually handle these things — I deal with the agent and Mike deals with the player," Stoneman said. "We were up front. We weren't hiding anything. I know Bengie wanted to come back, and obviously he was disappointed, but when we broke ties with him, there was not a lack of communication."

And though I think this may have come out before, it's probably worth mentioning again that Molina never got a chance to seal any deal with the Mets:

"What happened with the Mets is very simple," Molina said. "People think I turned down big money for nothing. It didn't happen that way.

"They offered me something and two days later we went back to them wanting to start negotiations. They said, 'We're dealing with [Carlos] Delgado.' "Then two days later they were dealing with Billy Wagner. Then they said call us on the weekend.

"We called [GM Omar Minaya] on the weekend and he was in the Dominican Republic. When he came back, he came back with the Paul Lo Duca trade [from Florida]. We never really had a chance to talk about anything. I don't think people know this. That's what really happened."

Well, given that things went down a little differently than in Molina's version of things, I wonder how true that is. But I'm too lazy to find out what Minaya's spin on all this is at the moment. On the other hand, Nero's account of things was consistent with that from the Angels' side of the fence. I'm not sure if that matters in this instance, though, because it's still Bengie giving the details of the Mets non-transaction.

Even if Bengie's description of the Mets deal is accurate, it's no knock against the Mets. They were working on two ways of gettting a catcher and ultimately decided on the Lo Duca trade. Seems fair enough...

It seems the Angels are still pursuing Jeff Weaver. From today's O.C. Regsiter . . .

'The Angels continue to dangle a short-term contract offer to Jeff Weaver, likely for one year and roughly $9million. But Stoneman said he would be content going to camp with veteran Hector Carrasco competing with minor-league pitchers, including Weaver's younger brother, Jered, for the fifth-starter job.

'"If we do it, then it happens. If we don't, we've got a good group of in-house guys," Stoneman said . . . .'

http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/sports/abox/article_993016.php

I like our chances with Jeffie in the rotation and Carrasco in the pen.

Wouldn't Jeff Weaver have reservations about possibly blocking his younger brother Jered's progress? After all, Stoneman has stated that Jered will have the opportunity to compete for the fifth starter's spot.

Are they already losing patience with kid? It's not as if he [Jered Weaver] has much professional experience under his belt.

Keep in mind, Scott Boras (and therefore Weaver the Younger himself) kept insisting that he was major-league ready coming out of college. If that's the case, then he theoretically should be ML-ready now.

He has shown a disturbing tendency to give up HR, and he'll never be a front-of-the-rotation guy if he consistently yields 40 dingers a season.